September 11th and the Small Miracle
Planning-4-Success with some thoughts about today.
Tears, destruction, clouds of dust. Firemen, policemen, paramedics – all heroes. These are the images forever tucked into the most delicate corners of our minds.
It’s impossible to forget all the feelings associated with that day.
Like the sound of silence that seized family rooms across the country. Loved ones huddled together around TV news reports – just staring at the devastation.
No doubt about it, on September 11, 2001, a nation changed. It was…
The Day America Came Together
No more Republicans, no more Democrats. No more sports rivalries. No more arguing and yelling “talking-heads” on TV.
Just a deep, dark somber feeling of shock, sorrow, confusion… and empathy and love.
Cell phone networks across the east coast quickly became overloaded and crashed, as loved ones called to check on loved ones. Friends checked on friends. Ex-boyfriends called ex-girlfriends.
The enormous weight of the tragedy urged every American to reach out to anyone who’d left footprints on their heart.
Andrea Mancuso, a New Yorker who worked nearby the WTC Towers somehow kept a cell phone signal.
She told the story, “Everyone was upset, and no one had a cell phone signal except me. I passed my phone around like a hot potato all the way to Harlem. Everyone including the cab driver graciously and tearfully called their families.”
Sadly, nearly 3,000 people never got to phone their loved ones again.
Amid all the destruction, there was one tiny symbol of hope.
A Small Miracle Among the Rubble
In October of 2011, one month into the clearing of the debris, a 30-year old callery pear tree was discovered.
It was badly burned, and had but one living branch. But the 8-foot tall pear tree, nonetheless, was still alive.
Soon the tree was moved, covered in ash, to a nursery in the Bronx where it wasn’t expected to survive.
But in the spring of 2002, that callery pear tree now deemed “The Survivor Tree” showed new growth. And it continued to grow in its new home for years, even when temporarily uprooted during a storm.
In December of 2010, at a new height of 30 feet, “The Survivor Tree” was replanted at the World Trade Center memorial.
Keating Crown, who escaped the 100th floor of the South Tower before it collapsed, said of the miracle pear tree:
“It reminds us all of the capacity of the human spirit to persevere.”
We depend on the capacity of the human spirit to persevere. It’s vital to our success as a people, a nation, a globe that we keep on moving forward.
Despite heartache, despite destruction, despite tragedy.
Times are somewhat different today than they were following 9/11; with some new struggles and new crises.
But we can come together as global citizens and ride out the economic storms that threaten our foundation, our way of life.
When the economic crisis inevitably emerges, we can grow again just like “The Survivor Tree.”
At Planning-4-Success we’ll weather the economic storm together, coming out stronger than ever before. And we’ll treasure the journey.
Thanks for reading, and take care on this special day.
Bill
PS: Thanks to the EV Group for this article.
